i scored a dream job at a record store

and in this store – besides all the great records cassettes and cds – were all these amazing people, all of whom taught me priceless things about the music we were selling.

the two most famous employees from Licorice Pizza in West LA at the time that i worked there were probably Gary Calamar who rocks the mic at KCRW on Sunday Nights and he also is the music supervisor for some of your favorite shows like Dexter, True Blood, and House where he picks the sweet tunes.

the other was Gunnar Nelson, the long haired blonde drummer and guitarist of Nelson, who i remember clearly asked for some time off so his band could perform as the musical act on Saturday Night Live. (to the chagrin of the many struggling musicians who also worked at the store.)

but one of the more interesting characters i’d ever met was one Tosh Berman who exuded class. not snobby class, just the opposite. class like he’d been somewhere and he wanted to share his badass exotic discoveries with you.

some people make you feel dumb when they teach you stuff, tosh made you want to just listen and listen and listen.

turns out Tosh went on to bigger and better after Licorice Pizza – as many of us have. and who knew he was the longtime book buyer for one of the best book stores in all of LA – Book Soup?

thanks to the magic of video + facebook + a cool blog named SinningInLA i got to see and hear Tosh exactly as I remembered him, just a tad grayer around the temples, giving a nice tour of the best book store on the Sunset Strip.

heres a photo of tosh and i with our coworker kara way back in the day.

i believe im tapping along to the dulcet tunes probably being played live by the ridiculously talented Willie Aaron of the Balancing Act.

it was Willie who turned me on to The Replacements, Lou Reed, and John Coltrane among others.

and yes i do believe thats a wine cooler in front of me. i told you it was back in the day!

how can the busblog be the first LA blog to notice this?

where’s LAist? Where’s Curbed LA? EaterLA?

how is it that the lowly granpa of an LA blog has this meltdown of a scoop?

thats the way Google Street View saw the old gal. Now theres a For Lease sign on it?

Not even the hyperactive UGC-powered Yelp has the news!?! Or Pinkberry.com itself?

How can this be??? I thought it was Crackberry and all the ladies and hipsters used it as rocket fuel while bloggers loooooved to write about its openings, closings, and copycat competitors?

Or the sweet pad the Pinkberry owners were able to buy from the Froyo.

The closing of the Abbot-Kinney Pinkberry gets blogged but not the Los Feliz locale? Someone’s gonna pull yr Eastside card, bloggers.

Oh well, guess you had to hear it here first.

see that soup? that delicious looking spicy coconut milk chicken soup with mushrooms?

only thing in the world that could make karisa hurl eases my upset stomach and soothes my soul.

the truest yesterday asked me if she could bring me anything and i said Palms Thai.

but because i love her so much i didnt want her to catch my deliberating bug. so i said no never mind.

then she asked dont they deliver? and i said no. sadly no. unfortunately no.

so i said i’ll order from an inferior place, dont worry. i live minutes from Thai Town for god sake and this is exactly what delivery is all about.

i go to palms thai anyways just to see if things have changed. and bam look at it, no better words could i have seen: Now Deliver.

ordered up my food, threw the wastebasket filling over with used kleenex into the dumpster, washed my hands, and when the next fine lady asked what she could do for me i said, just send me a nude.

your boy had turned the corner and was making a recovery.

yes ive been blogging while sick:

Rand Paul coordinator Tim Profitt admits to stepping on woman from MoveOn.org before Kentucky debate

Tim Profitt blames police and his bad back for his Kentucky stomp and wants victim to apologize to him

Christine O’Donnell threatens to sue radio station, retreats when reminded about the 1st Amendment

Sharron Angle ad spurs a … colorful … outburst by ‘The View’s’ Joy Behar

Sharron Angle gives Joy Behar flowers; ‘The View’ co-host calls the candidate that name again

heres a self portrait

if i die, ive loved you all.

scatter my blog in the bleachers.

from a press release i got yesterday but was too busy being busy

In what can only be described as a bizarre coincidence, following an exhaustive re-sequence marathon, Beastie Boys have verified that their new Hot Sauce Committee Part 2 will be comprised of the same 16 tracks originally slated for inclusion on Hot Sauce Committee Part 1.

The record (part 2 that is) will be released as planned in spring 2011 on Capitol.

The tracks originally recorded for Hot Sauce Committee Part 2 (which now are actually back on Part 1) have now apparently been bumped to make room for the former Hot Sauce Committee Part 1 material. Wait, what?

“I know it’s weird and confusing, but at least we can say unequivocally that Hot Sauce Committee Part 2 is coming out on time, which is more than I can say about Part 1, and really is all that matters in the end.” says Adam “MCA” Yauch. “We just kept working and working on various sequences for part 2, and after a year and half of spending days on end in the sequencing room trying out every possible combination, it finally became clear that this was the only way to make it work. Strange but true, the final sequence for Hot Sauce Committee Part 2 works best with all its songs replaced by the 16 tracks we originally had lined up in pretty much the same order we had them in for Hot Sauce Committee Part 1. So we’ve come full circle.”

Hot Sauce Committee Part 2 marks Yauch, Mike “Mike D” Diamond, and Adam “Ad Rock” Horovitz’s first full length effort since 2007’s Grammy winning all-instrumental The Mix-Up. The new track listing of the album is now as follows:

1. Tadlock’s Glasses
2. B-Boys In The Cut
3. Make Some Noise
4. Nonstop Disco Powerpack
5. OK
6. Too Many Rappers (featuring NAS)
7. Say It
8. The Bill Harper Collection
9. Don’t Play No Game That I Can’t Win (featuring Santigold)
10. Long Burn The Fire
11. Funky Donkey
12. Lee Majors Come Again
13. Multilateral Nuclear Disarmament
14. Pop Your Balloon
15. Crazy Ass S—
16. Here’s A Little Something For Ya

Recently nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2011, Beastie Boys are the single longest lived hip-hop act to continue to enjoy commercial and critical success. Formed in 1981, Beastie Boys first changed the course of popular music when their 1986 debut album Licensed To Ill became the first hip hop record to reach #1. Since then, Diamond, Horovitz and Yauch have amassed 40 million in record sales of a critically acclaimed canon including 1989’s landmark Paul’s Boutique, 1992’s Check Your Head, the #1-debuting trifecta of 1994’s Ill Communication, 1998’s Hello Nasty and 2004’s To The 5 Boroughs, and 2007’s The Mix-Up. Beastie Boys’ innovative videos earned them MTV’s Video Vanguard Lifetime Achievement award in 1998, while a Madison Square Garden show shot by 50 audience members was painstakingly edited into AWESOME; I F—-N’ SHOT THAT!, which debuted at Sundance in 2006. The band has also been lauded for its humanitarian efforts, ranging from organizing the Tibetan Freedom Concert series which drew attention to the Chinese government’s human rights violations in Tibet, to the New Yorkers Against Violence benefits, whose proceeds went to organizations chosen for their efforts on behalf of September 11th victims least likely to receive help elsewhere.

The exact release date of Hot Sauce Committee Part 2 and touring plans will be announced once details are available

clear up everything? (bold statement bolded by moi)

dyson is a litle kid who likes to wear dresses and jewlery and spin around in pink things

his mom and dad are apparently the most grounded people in the entire nation

and their school should also be commended.

i dont think ive ever seen anything quite like this, and if you stick around to the end of the video you’ll hear what his older brother has to say about it all.

via MeFi who always seems to find excellence

you’ll feel better

if you hurl you’ll feel better too.

today ive done both. several times.

i guess really wanna go back to work tomorrow!

(i do)

it may have been the plane. it may have been the rain. or the cold

all i know is i woke up early and couldnt get to sleep, so ive been blogging from home on Top of the Ticket because i like to feel needed.

Christine O’Donnell: God is the reason I’m running

Rob Reiner likens ‘tea party’ movement to Hitler

Rhode Island Democratic candidate tells Obama he can ‘take his endorsement and really shove it’

know whats funny about the blogosphere? the Reiner post got me a link from MediaBistro and i think the dude is calling me a conservative which doesnt happen a lot when you write for the Times